


Practice Makes Perfect

by entanglednow



Category: Star Trek (2009)
Genre: Humor, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-08-26
Updated: 2009-08-26
Packaged: 2017-10-15 13:05:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,879
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/161085
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/entanglednow/pseuds/entanglednow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Escape attempt number two is more of a spur of the moment sort of thing that happens while they're dragging him back to his cell. It fails, miserably.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Practice Makes Perfect

The walls are solid, Jim knows this because he's been knocking on them for more than an hour. They're solid from top to bottom. The floor and the ceiling too.

"Can you not do that," McCoy says through his teeth.

"What?"

"You're making _noise._ " There's the suggestion that the noise in question isn't in any way soothing or encouraging.

"I'm trying to find a way out of here," Jim protests mid knock. He's kind of annoyed about the fact that McCoy is complaining when he's the one trying to get them out of here. It's not like their ten by ten room is giving him much in the way of assistance. Plain walls, two built-in beds, the ventilation access is too small to provide any sort of escape and the tech inside the cell is designed to only be accessible from the outside.

Thinking outside the box is more of a literal sort of thing here.

"They're probably watching, you're probably providing hours of entertainment for their entire security force."

It's his own stupid fault that they got captured in the first place.

His own stupid mouth that he can't keep shut and, though he doesn't regret a single word, he's angry that it got him shoved in a cell.

He's more angry that it got McCoy shoved in here with him. That's definitely his fault, and now they're packed up and ready to be ransomed back to the Federation at some sort of hideously exorbitant price.

That's completely unacceptable.

So he refuses to sleep until they're free.

"I think I can get into this panel in the wall."

McCoy grunts something unimpressed on the other bed, where he's been sat miserably since they both got shoved through the sliding door.

"Let me just prise it up-"

  
~~~

  
 _Escape attempt number one is a complete failure and leaves them without light or power in their cell for twelve hours._

 _Jim is almost certain he can hear their captors laughing._

 _He's definitely certain he can hear McCoy glaring at him from the other bed._

  
~~~

  
The next morning, their cell is opened by three guards and Jim is hustled out and locked into cuffs, before being dragged out into the brightness of the corridor.

There's clearly going to be some interrogation to go along with their captivity.

  
~~~

  
 _Escape attempt number two is more of a spur of the moment sort of thing that happens while they're dragging him back to his cell. It fails, miserably._

  
~~~

  
Jim pokes at a bruise.

As interrogation techniques go he's had worse.

"I can't believe you're actually enjoying this," McCoy sounds like he's had his irritation bottled up for a while. Just waiting for the opportunity to use it on him.

"I'm not _enjoying_ it." Jim stops cataloguing his bruises in favour of trying to look serious.

"You're treating it with the same irreverent half-assed bravado as you do everything else."

"Half-assed?" Jim's insulted by that. " _Half-assed?_ "

McCoy pokes his bruise, in a way that feels like both punishment and him making his point.

"Ow! I am absolutely taking this seriously."

McCoy shakes his head.

"You're incapable of taking a mission seriously. Why should I expect you to take your own kidnapping seriously."

"I'm absolutely capable of taking a mission seriously."

"What about the mission to Peleidies 7?" McCoy drawls at him, in a 'get out of this one' sort of way.

"I took that mission seriously," Jim says carefully, because he knows where McCoy is going here.

"Before or after you named the planet after yourself?"

"There wasn't anything on it," Jim protests. Which is fair, because there wasn't.

" _Yet,_ there wasn't anything on it yet."

Jim makes a satisfied noise at the white ceiling. "They would have made me their god."

"And you would have made a lousy one," McCoy tells him, with the sort of half abusive and half mocking honesty you can only get from a really good friend.

  
~~~

  
 _Jim doesn't remember a lot about escape attempt number three. He ends up on the floor of the cell with all his hair standing on end and the ends of his fingers tingling._

 _His chest hurts and his mouth tastes funny._

 _McCoy calls him a handful of colourful and unrepeatable things._

  
~~~

  
They come early the next morning. Bland alien faces almost impossible to read under the bright lights. Jim's not entirely surprised to see them. Once you start an interrogation you don't stop until you actually learn something.

But he's damned if he's going to go willingly, or quietly.

Until one of them catches hold of McCoy's elbow and hauls him upright.

Jim punches him in the face.

They drag him out instead.

It's a good day.

  
~~~

  
Jim hates consciousness with a passion. He can feel every single one of his bruises and there is not one position that makes all of them happy at the same time.

McCoy doesn't poke him for a change, instead he just glides his fingers over every tight broken stretch of skin and calls him a variety of unflattering things under his breath.

Jim almost wishes he would make it hurt, the low thrum of adrenaline's easing off and the bone deep ache of it all sort of makes him want to lay on his face and sleep for a week.

Instead he has the warmth of McCoy's hands, which is a completely different sensation. One he doesn't have the brain power to deal with at the moment.

"You're insane," McCoy chastises, though his voice is strangely soft.

"They're persistent but they have no class. It's like they don't even want to learn Federation secrets."

A thumb is briefly too insistent on the edge of his jaw and he loses his smirk halfway through.

"Ow."

"You'll live." He's told, with not a touch of enthusiasm. Though he's not fooled for a minute, and McCoy’s hands are almost reluctant when they slide away.

Jim finds a totally uncomfortable position on his own bed, and then suffers in it.

His smile takes too much energy but he thinks maybe McCoy needs it.

His gratitude is a vaguely disgusted expression, as if he's just providing further proof that he's a lunatic. But when he leans back into the wall he makes a point of watching him. Maybe to make sure he doesn't somehow injure himself further trying something ludicrous.

McCoy eventually falls asleep in that position.

Jim's smile falls apart at the edges the moment he shuts his eyes.

He still refuses to sleep, not just because there isn't a chance in hell of him leaving himself defenceless when he doesn't know who's watching.

It's pitch black and his muscles all feel like they seized up hours ago.

He thinks he should be attempting to escape but there's a boot shaped imprint on his chest that continues to punish him even when he's not moving, or breathing.

Still, he feels like a complete failure for not even trying.

  
~~~

  
 _Escape attempt number four requires a certain amount of method acting. It turns out McCoy is a terrible actor. Jim's going to blame him for the failure, it's only fair._

  
~~~

  
"How about if I fake a horrible illness?" Jim asks quietly.

"I'll let you fake die," McCoy tells him. He's laying on his back on the other bed, continuing his bid to waste away in captivity.

"Come on, it's a good idea!"

"It's an old idea," McCoy grunts. "It's about as believable as the whole 'seducing the guard' technique."

There's a long pause while Jim thinks about that.

"Don't bother," McCoy is clearly now reading his mind. "They don't have any genitals."

...

"I'm suddenly a lot more understanding of their frustrated need to take prisoners and treat them badly."

"You really can't control yourself can you?" McCoy shakes his head.

"It was a joke- I can control myself."

McCoy's huff isn't convinced. "I honestly don't know what's wrong with you, but maybe one day they'll find a cure for it. Until then I'll just have to document it for future generations."

"Do you even care than I'm trying to get us out of here?"

"I wouldn't have put it past you to have orchestrated the whole thing," McCoy grumbles.

Jim's honestly insulted by that, because if he was going to concoct some ridiculous kidnapping and imprisonment scheme it would be a hell of a lot more fun than this.

He stretches the aches out of his less tender muscles, and curses his more tender ones.

It's the first night he has to force himself to stay awake.

  
~~~

  
 _Escape attempt number five suffers from a lack of planning. They're hustled back to their cell in a ridiculously short space of time. Jim is kind of embarrassed about it._

 _The guard uniforms didn't fit anyway._

  
~~~

  
"I am slightly disappointed that I never got to have sex with you," Jim says. He's too tired to be anything other than honest. Though he suspects it's the clumsy kind of honest that's liable to get him slapped.

It wouldn't be the first time.

McCoy glares at him in the darkness, some combination of irritation, disbelief and insult. Or maybe that's just his natural expression. Jim definitely sees it a lot.

He's sprawled carefully on his own bed, legs laid loosely up the wall.

"Really, I was going to work up to it. It would have involved lots of manly injuries and nudity," he adds, just in case that helped.

"Neither of which I'm interested in," McCoy complains. He sounds tired too.

"I was going to try and change your mind. I'm good at that."

"You were going to irritate me constantly until I hyposprayed you and left you in an airlock." McCoy makes it sound like a perfectly sensible option.

"I do that already, if you were going to airlock me you would have done it months ago."

There's a long irritated sigh from across the cell.

"Go to sleep Jim."

Jim grunts protest. "No until we get out of here."

"Sleep deprivation can drive you mad you know."

"I thought you told me I was mad already?"

"Mad-er then," McCoy decides. "Though whether anyone would notice the difference is debateable."

Jim tries to remember where the conversation started, and finds he's not quite sure.

Somewhere around...

"So, if I did try- would it be a no every time?"

"Go to sleep." There's a fierce insistence in the words, but they're not as loud as before, almost gentle.

Jim lays in the darkness until the sound of McCoy's breathing goes deep and slow.

  
~~~

  
 _Escape attempt number six never happens, he's on his own and there's no way he's leaving without his chief medical officer._

 _The angry guard makes his loyalty hurt._

 _But Jim thinks maybe that's the only loyalty that counts._

  
~~~

  
"Are you collecting these?" McCoy sounds unfairly irritated while he pokes and prods at Jim's colourful skin.

"I'm honing my skills."

"Your skills suck," McCoy tells him.

"Why do you think I'm honing them?" Jim protests without a pause. He tries to console himself with the knowledge that one day this won't hurt quite so much. That he won't need to distract his doctor with half coherent exhausted rambling to hide the fact that he feels like he's fallen off a mountain.

Not an experience he'd ever thought he'd repeat, and the fact that this time there's no mountain involved is completely unfair. At least with a mountain you could point and say 'look at the size of that, yeah, I fell off of that.'

He's getting far too used to McCoy's hands on his face though.

Which is far more confusing in his current, slightly dizzy, sleep-deprived state.

It's an ever-repeating litany of bruises and skin and insult. Thumbs turning his jaw this way and that, possibly to make sure he's not leaking anything important. Or maybe McCoy just likes to make it hurt.

But he's always so close, breathing over his face and frowning in that way he has that Jim is far too attached to, and really there's no excuse for being this close and not kissing.

It's impossible to think that and not kiss him.

McCoy makes a noise of terrible disbelief against his mouth

Jim's pretty sure he's going to be called names again.

McCoy kisses him back instead, he complains the whole time, like it's a terrible hardship, but it's a breathless, agreeable sort of complaint.

"How long has it been since you slept?"

"Wednesday, or Thursday," Jim tells him honestly. He kisses him again before the disapproving noise can escape and instead there's just a muffled protest.

"You're insane and this is insane," he manages in the moments when Jim isn't being insistent. He'd take his protests of insanity a lot more seriously if he wasn't doing something un-doctorly with his hands, Jim's half tempted to call him on it, but thinks it will probably make him stop.

And that's unacceptable.

His hands are slow, almost careful, like he's trying to avoid Jim's bruises, but he's finding every single one of them and it hurts but not in any way that's bad.

Jim has the rough edge of his mouth shoved into his own, and fingers buried in his hair and he doesn't feel anywhere close to unwilling.

McCoy is too heavy on the bruises that count but Jim encourages him in closer, breathing laughter and smugness and promises offered alongside half amused gasps of discomfort when fingers or a knee or hipbones press in somewhere tender.

But McCoy stays where he is, doesn't ease up, doesn't stop. Which is worth something. He hisses irritated curses into his mouth, shoving his hands up under his shirt. Jim breathes and winces and knows that he's going to pay for his enthusiasm later, or tomorrow. Some time that isn't now, so it doesn't really matter.

It's the first time McCoy carefully eases himself onto a hand.

"If I do anything you're going to break."

"I'll never break," Jim assures him, half laugh and half quiet groan when fingers push too deep.

"Break," McCoy insists.

"I've had enough interrogation bruises, I would really like some sex bruises." Jim thinks that was pretty polite under the circumstances.

McCoy huffs helpless laughter into his mouth.

"You really are unbelievable."

"Not just that," Jim insists, to the question that wasn't even asked. He finds the warm bare skin under the bottom of McCoy’s shirt. "Never just that, not with you, don't make me be serious, I'm too damn tired."

"Worried you'll say something honest?"

Jim doesn't answer him, he tugs him down by untidy fists full of shirt and when that isn't enough he drags it up and over his head, leaves it on the floor of the cell.

McCoy shoves his own up in revenge and Jim just manages not to wince when he drags it over his head. The doctor makes a soft noise that's half mockery and half honest want.

"You're like a watercolour painting."

Jim's instantly attached to the way his voice sounds when he's aroused. New and shaky and just a little too deep.

His hands, half clumsy where they ache, see if McCoy will let him push just a little further, fingers sliding in the front of his pants, skin warm and then shifting away when he breathes in and that's as close to permission as he needs. More than enough and rather than risk enough time for him to decide he wants to refuse Jim pushes at the loose waistband with his hands.

"Wait." A breath of impatience and then there's bare skin under his hands, shocking enough that he tightens his fingers, open mouth crushed briefly, and aggressively, before he loses his own pants in one movement.

Everything is closer and hotter, the sting of fresh bruises just a little more immediate.

But he doesn't break, even when everything is a little too hard and too fast, and every breath out aches just a little, it's too good to stop.

Much too good to stop.

He ends up breathing into McCoy's mouth, breath shuddering out of him. Trying desperately to hang onto the edge of release and absolutely refusing to feel what comes afterwards when he has to move his limbs again.

There isn't really enough space on the bed, but everywhere else is too far away.

"Bones-" Jim starts, though he's not quite sure what he's going to say.

"Go to sleep," McCoy tells him, in a disgruntled sort of way.

Jim honestly can't think of a good reason not to do as he's told.

Which is something of a first.

  
~~~

  
The guard comes at seven in the morning with their breakfast.

When the door opens Jim hits him in the face as hard as he can.

He goes down like a waterfall under the force of the punch, lands on the floor in a sprawl that says there isn't a chance he's going to be in control of his limbs again any time soon.

Jim thinks he's probably broken at least half of his fingers. He's surprised by how little it hurts.

He steals the guard's gun and his keys and drags McCoy, still grumbling about his half-assed attitude to capture, out of the cell.

He thinks he finally has this whole _escaping_ thing figured out.


End file.
